


Home, Again

by red_scully



Category: The X-Files
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-05-21
Updated: 2016-05-21
Packaged: 2018-06-09 21:32:47
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,323
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6924250
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/red_scully/pseuds/red_scully
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Post-episode for Home Again, because leaving them on that bench was just cruel: Moose and Squirrel had to go somewhere when the night fell. This is also a sort of sequel to my story 'Feel'. Therefore, spoilers for Home Again and Sein And Zeit.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Home, Again

A boat moved silently and slowly across the far end of the lake, and a mist gathered, bringing a sharp chill to the air. Mulder tightened his grip on Scully's shoulder, feeling her body tight and rigid against his. They sat together for what seemed like forever, the only sign of time passing at all being the slow fade of day to dusk. The forest nearby quieted, as its inhabitants prepared for the coming night: they returned to their nests, crawled into their dens, or otherwise secreted themselves away to safety. Everything took on an eerie quality, shrouded as it was in the damp mist and gently dying light. Boat occupants aside, not another person was around to witness the sun slipping away and this day coming to an end.

She breathed slowly against his shoulder, resting where she fitted as if the spot had been made just for her. Wide ripples were travelling across the lake in the boat's wake, eventually dissipating, and he wondered about the physics that created the effect: Scully could probably explain it, if he asked her. The urn sat by their feet, its presence somehow thickening the air, as commanding and unapologetic as Maggie had ever been in life. His heart ached with sadness. He had loved her dearly, this woman who had been a surrogate mother of sorts, who had been there when Scully had gone missing, who had always been so kind to him even when her daughter lay dying and all signs pointed to him as the reason why.

Her daughter was the most extraordinary woman Mulder had ever met. His love for her was still a surprise to him after all these years. That day when he found out she was being assigned to the X-Files, he had wanted so badly to hate her, but then she had arrived in the office and his life and somehow managed to be a giant pain in the ass and at the same time a source of more strength and compassion than he had ever known. She sparred with him like Phoebe, but without the malice or vindictiveness; she trusted him like Diana, but without all the layers of twisted double-crossing. And god, was she beautiful.

His beautiful Scully, for whom he had literally once travelled to the ends of the earth: here she sat, slumped against him, suffering yet another devastating loss which he was unable to fix.

He looked at her fondly, her beautiful face older, more tired than it once had been, but still the only face he ever wanted to gaze upon. She looked sad, but peaceful, in the frigid gloom: resting beside him, quiet with reflection, as if all their struggles had evaporated, as if the past year had ceased to be, as if she had never stopped wanting to be beside him always. He could look at her forever.

But the chill around them was increasing, and eventually he had to disturb her thoughts. Leaning close to her, he murmured, "Scully. We should go. It's getting cold." His breath was visible in the air, a warm cloud against her cheek. She looked up, her eyes watery and barely focusing on him, and nodded.

\--

Mulder drove. He had cranked the heating up as far as it would go, but Scully’s entire body felt so cold and numb that it was as if she was detached from herself. The radio, tuned to a talk station, sounded as distant as if it had been submerged in ice water. Everything seemed out of focus, far away. She drew a breath, then let it out slowly, sensing every second pass like a century. As Mulder negotiated the vehicle through the now-dark streets, she willed herself to feel motion: the wheels turning beneath them, a bump as the car hit a pothole, the hum of the engine beneath her, anything to anchor her to this reality. But there was just nothing, nothing, nothing. It was like being drunk, only without the warmth of a belly full of alcohol.

The urn was heavy and cold in her hands. In this vase, she told herself, are the remains of my mother. My mother is gone. She has died. She is never coming back. Scully prodded at the thoughts in her head, trying to elicit some feeling, like poking a bruise to see whether it still hurt. Your parents are gone, she thought. You have lost your father, and your sister, and now your mother.

Nothing stirred within her. She looked at Mulder. He, too, had lost a sister and both his parents. Had he been this numb, too, when he became an orphan? Had he gone to this place of quiet and emptiness? She cast her mind back to that time, so long ago, when they were young, and hadn't lost their child, and were both consumed by their work. It seemed so distant and foreign that it took some time to locate the timeframe in her head, but when she found it the sudden memory rushed in, crashing over her like a wave, and she remembered that night, right after Teena had died. It was, she recalled, the first night she and Mulder had been together. It was dark, and they were right in the middle of one of the worst cases they'd ever been assigned, and just when they'd thought it couldn't get much worse, Teena had killed herself. Scully remembered his face when she returned to his apartment after the most upsetting autopsy of her career. She had never told him that during the process she had actually run out and thrown up in the sink, the one and only time in her life that doing a post-mortem exam had actually disgusted her. She did it even though she didn't want to, because he needed her to be the one who told him the findings: because he would never believe anyone else; because he knew someone would have to force him to accept what had happened, and she was the only one who would have that ability; and because he knew she would always tell him the truth.

So she had stood in his apartment and told him her findings, and had watched, heartbroken, as he completely fell apart in front of her. The sound of his harsh, animal sobs echoed now in her ears; the hotness of his breath against her cheek made her face flush anew; the urgent grip of his hands on her body as he had tried to find something real and tangible and alive to hold onto in the midst of his grief sent an irresistible shudder through her. He had been as lost and desperate, on that dark evening, as she had ever known him to be, but until now she'd never been able to recognise the place he had been lost in. Yes, she suddenly knew as she sat in this car, unmoving at a dark, unlit intersection: Mulder had been in this place of numbness and deep loss, and he had responded in a way which she had only ever understood on an intellectual level. Now, though: now, she knew what Mulder felt, in the most physical, visceral way.  
   
He must have noticed her start in her seat, because he reached over and put a hand to her cheek, turning to gaze briefly into her eyes. His touch burned her skin and all of a sudden she was on fire: she had to feel him, now. She grabbed the back of his head and pulled him towards her roughly, crushing a kiss onto his lips. She shivered as heat coursed through her and she felt a violent, desperate urge between her legs. He pulled suddenly away from her, and she realised he was flooring the accelerator, causing the car to jump wildly forwards, pinning her into her seat. The seatbelt tightened, digging into her neck because she was too damn short for it to fit her properly, and she grabbed at the dashboard to steady herself. Looking over, she saw his hands were shaking on the wheel, and his breath was fast and ragged, and he was licking his lips and clearly not looking at her on purpose, and then he hit the brakes and she was thrown forwards. And then his hands were in her hair, and his tongue was in her mouth, and he tasted hot and sweet and oh my god, she thought, I need him nownownownownow. Seatbelts somehow got released, his seat was pushed way back, and she clambered into his lap, hitching her skirt up around her waist as she went, ignoring her screaming knees as she straddled him, instead focusing on the feel of his mouth on hers and how hard he was beneath her writhing body. With violently trembling hands she reached down and unzipped his pants and pulled him free, then she pushed her damp panties to one side and sank down onto him roughly, and dear god, it was exquisite to be so full, he was hot and hard and she felt so good that a shudder ran up her spine. Biting down on his neck, her hands roamed his body as she desperately searched for a rhythm, and he was clutching at her back, his breath sharp against her cheek, pushing up into her. She felt her entire body bloom with pleasure, feeling him hot and hard and fast and delicious beneath her and then she fell into a deep shuddering orgasm just as he pumped up from below and muttered, “fuck,” into her ear, and then, just like that, it was done, and she slumped against him feeling hot, and full, and boneless.  
   
It seemed like hours passed, although it was almost certainly only a few minutes. He was nudging her, gently saying her name. She came to slowly, like floating to the surface of water. She looked at him. A smile crept across his face.  
   
“Uh, well, it’s been sometime since we’ve done that.” He chuckled lightly. “Are you ok?”  
   
She drew a deep, shaky breath and took stock of the situation. She was ok. Her knees were killing her, it was stiflingly hot in the car, her shirt was stuck to her back with sweat. She widened her eyes and looked out of the window, wiping away condensation with her hand. They were parked in a tiny alleyway, god knew where. She nodded.  
   
“Yeah. Yeah, I’m ok. Yikes.” She raised her eyebrows at him. “I thought I was way too old to manage this sort of thing.” He helped her climb back into the passenger seat: she smiled in wonder at how she had gotten into his lap so easily. She watched as he tucked his dick back into his pants and started the car. His hands were still shaking a little, she noticed. She looked down. Hers were, too.  
   
Back at her apartment, they made straight for her bedroom without saying a word to each other. Unspoken communication had always been their thing, and she was grateful for it now, because she was tired of trying to find words to express how she felt. She stripped off her clothes in front of him without shame or ceremony of any kind, then made for the bathroom to clean herself up after their unplanned (and, she noted to herself, unsafe) union. She left the door open.

She watched from the toilet as he pulled off his own clothes and then left the room to fetch, she knew, a glass of water. Mulder was a creature of habit. She also knew he would kick their discarded garments towards the laundry basket but not quite into it. When he came back in and did just that, she smiled fondly.

Once she was done, she climbed straight into bed. He took his turn in the bathroom whilst she tried to get comfortable. She'd been living here alone for a while now, and had taken to sleeping in the middle of the bed, but now she took her side, the right, and it felt unfamiliar and strange.

That is, until he climbed in beside her and moulded his long, warm body against hers. All at once everything fell into place. He was here. Her mother was gone. Hot tears sprang to her eyes, and she wept in Mulder's arms. He muttered soothing things into her ear, things meant only for her, and he held her tightly and she hated herself for leaving him all alone in that house. She sniffed hard, a lump in her throat. He planted a kiss on her cheek. She turned to face him.

"Thank you," she found herself whispering.

He gazed at her.

"Scully, you don't have to thank me for being here. It's what I'm supposed to do. You were there for me when my mother died."

She bit her lip, remembering that night again, but now recalling the softer moments: holding him in her arms as he cried; stroking his face gently as he slept. She had felt her love for him deepen that night, and not because of the explosion of passion it had started with. In fact, the sex had almost been an ice breaker: a way to cut the tension, to get past it, to reach a place where they could be gentle with each other without the endless question of *are we ever gonna sleep together* hanging in the air.

She supposed that was why it had happened tonight, too. Since Skinner had called and they'd started speaking to each other again, the question was back. She felt it every time their eyes met, and with every conversation: Where are we going, what are we doing, doyouwantmebackwillwefallintobedtogether?

Now here she lay, enveloped in his love, the question literally answered.

Her heart ached with grief, but Mulder was here. She would get through this. They would get through this.


End file.
